Romney's Massive Retirement Account Remains Unexplained
As Mitt Romney’s refusal to release further tax returns becomes a central issue in the presidential race, a related question first raised in January remains stubbornly unanswered: How did Romney build such a massive Individual Retirement Account?

The size of the GOP presidential candidate's IRA is "very unusual," said Rebecca Wilkins, senior counsel for federal tax policy at the non-profit advocacy group Citizens for Tax Justice. "The Romney campaign has not been that forthcoming."

According to Romney’s disclosure documents, the candidate has between $20.7 million and $101.6 million parked tax-free in his IRA -- a significant proportion of his total wealth, as noted by Mark Maremont in the Wall Street Journal.

It’s a whopping sum by most standards; according to the nonprofit Employee Benefit Research Institute, the average IRA held $67,438 dollars in 2010.

Since that figure was first reported, questions about Romney's IRA have continued to dog his campaign; a recent column by William Cohan in Bloomberg View and a thorough investigation of Romney's finances in Vanity Fair both cast a skeptical eye on the account.
There are limits to the amount of money individuals can contribute to their IRAs. Before Romney was elected Massachusetts governor, federal law capped annual pre-tax IRA contributions at $2,000 and annual 401(k) retirement contributions at $30,000 with a company match as the Journal notes. Cohan reported that Bain used what’s known as a SEP-IRA during Romney's time as head of Bain, which has a slightly higher yearly maximum contribution of $30,000.

Given these contribution limits, experts are scratching their heads about the rapid growth of the account in the decade since Romney officially left the private equity firm Bain Capital.

“It’s extremely unusual,” said George Yin, a professor of law and taxation at the University of Virginia and former chief of staff of the U.S. Congress Joint Committee on Taxation. “The IRA, since its inception, has had very clear limits on the amount that can be contributed each year. And it's way less than $100 million.”

The Romney campaign has offered little explanation; Andrea Saul, a Romney campaign spokesperson, did not respond to a request seeking comment for this story. In the Journal report, a Romney aide said the IRA accumulated 'through annual contributions, rollovers of sums in other retirement plans, and successful investments."

But there are a few specific theories that attempt to explain the account's growth.

The first is that Romney acquired stock from his Bain investments -- specifically high-risk, high-reward shares that had a low initial value (and thus didn’t violate the contribution limits) but paid off when the companies became more profitable. If he filled his IRA with these stocks, that could account for some of the exponential growth, as Cohan notes.

“Even though the contribution limits are small, if the stock growth is tremendous, you could possibly get up to something close to [$100 million],” said Yin, adding “though it still seems amazing to me.”
If that's the explanation, than Romney’s partners at Bain would likely have seen similar returns, and might even have similar amounts in their IRAs. “Why aren’t all the Bain partners coming forward and saying ‘yeah, we all have 100 million IRA’s too?” Cohan asked in an interview with The Huffington Post.
Another possible explanation, noted by Felix Salmon in a recent Reuters blog post, is that the growth is not from shares in Bain investments Romney shoved into his IRA, but rather shares in the private equity firm itself of which Romney was the sole shareholder until he left in 2002.

A sophisticated but legal method of shielding income from taxes, which involves investing an IRA in what is known as “blocker corporations,” as pointed out in Vanity Fair, may also have played a role.

By law, most investment income that flows into an IRA is tax-free with the notable exception of income that comes from running a business, said Ed Slott of Ed Slott and Co., a tax expert who specializes in IRAs. That income is subject to a special tax known as the Unrelated Business Income Tax.

But one way to avoid that tax is to set up a blocker corporation, an intermediary company that on paper own the companies. That allows income received from the investments to be counted as an investment dividend and thus avoids taxes.

“It’s an extraordinary maneuver,” said Slott.

If Romney's IRA does indeed use blocker corporations, it means “he created this buffer, this intermediary entity to turn what would be taxable income into tax-deferred income in the IRA,” Slott said. "That’s not what most people [are able to] do.”
There’s another big question that leaves experts scratching their heads: Why does Romney have all that money in a retirement account to begin with?

While IRAs are tax exempt now, by law Romney must begin withdrawing cash by age 70 and a half. When he does, “the withdrawal receives no special tax breaks. It is subject to ordinary income tax rates, which right now are as high as 35 percent,” said Slott.

“I think it is unusual to earn these profits in IRA accounts,” for precisely this reason, said Richard Bronstein, a tax lawyer at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. “It’s more common to earn this in taxable accounts, because capital gains rates are not really high.”
It the money came from his income as a private equity chief, it would be taxed at the current carried interest rate of 15 percent, rather than the income rate of up to 35 percent.
What’s more, said Bronstein, “if he has $100 million in his IRA, it’s not very accessible. You accumulate a fortune in a tax-exempt account, but you can’t use it to buy a boat or an elevator for your car.”

So far, Romney has said little publicly about his retirement account, leaving experts and the public with little information beyond speculation. “Nobody really knows what the explanation is,” said Slott. “Everybody’s guessing.”
One thing is clear. While most Americans have the ability to open an IRA, very few have the opportunity to engage in the sort of scrupulous tax planning Romney has shown.

“Romney is an aggressive tax planner,” said Wilkins.”He’s not just collecting his paycheck and dividends from Bain, he’s planning his affairs in the most tax advantageous [way possible].”
Still, Wilkins added, “I used to be a C.P.A. in private practice. It was not unusual for someone to roll over a $3,000 IRA. But $20 or $100 million? It’s unfathomable.”

Well, I am a Romulan, but I have been having trouble getting an original of my long form Romulan birth certificate.

Am am curious to see if Romney was a participant in either the Swiss account amnesty program or did he make a settlement with the IRS under the deal with the Swiss for a list of US tax avoiders.

I am told the only reason to have a Swiss account is tax avoidance, yet he paid taxes on interest. Accountants say that doesn't make sense. Most of these accounts don't earn interest, but no one cares since they are paying no taxes on the profits they are parking there, sometimes from investments in the US, or gambling profits, or drug money via a Cayman Islands shell corporation. Sound vaguely familiar?

"Did Mitt Romney Pay ZERO Taxes ? -- A Shocking Possibility. Our tax code is broken — really broken. It’s rigged for the rich and against the middle class. How rigged ? It’s possible that Mitt Romney paid no federal taxes at all in 2009, which would explain why once again today he said he wouldn’t release any tax returns from before 2010." : http://thinkprogress.org/progress-report/did-mitt-romney-pay-zero-taxes/ & ...

Nah noo Nah noo, someone suggested that there might actually be some casino money there and that might pose some complications with the LDS folks. I don't believe the last half of that since I assume they got their 10% and they used to own all of the illegal clubs and brothels in the Utah area. Money trumps ideology, don't you see.

The most mysterious of the unexplained mysteries about Mitt Romney’s considerable wealth is how he was able to amass between $21 million and $102 million in his individual retirement account during the 15 years he was at Bain Capital LLC.
How did he do it, given the relatively small amounts that the law permits to be contributed to such a plan on an annual basis? Romney has not explained this conundrum, and seeing as he wants to become president, he would be wise to start talking -- if for no other reason than there might be many Americans who would like to emulate what he did.
About William D Cohan

William D. Cohan is the author of the recently released "Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World" and the New York Times bestsellers "House of Cards" and "The Last Tycoons."
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During Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital -- from 1984 to 1999, although a recent Boston Globe article uncovered Romney having a role at Bain until 2002 -- the firm used a so-called SEP-IRA, which is like a 401(k) retirement plan but is funded entirely by the employer and has a much higher maximum contribution: about $30,000 annually during the period Romney was at Bain. Assuming Romney maxed out these tax-deferred contributions, he would have invested roughly $450,000 in his SEP-IRA during his years at Bain.
Skilled Investors

While there are limits to the amount that can be contributed tax-deferred to an IRA, there are no restrictions on the amount of money that the contributed capital can earn and can continue to earn, on a tax-deferred basis, even after the contributions have stopped. (The Internal Revenue Service will get its pound of flesh from Romney when he takes the money out of the IRA.) The only limit is the skill, or luck, of the IRA’s owner. If you are the Warren Buffett of IRA investors, it is conceivable that you could turn $450,000 into as much as $102 million -- an increase of 227 times -- but not very likely, especially as in the last decade or so, the stock market has been a roller coaster. Mere investing mortals would be lucky to still have $450,000 in the account. (The median American family has $42,500 in traditional IRAs, according to the Investment Company Institute.)

So how did Romney do it? Of course, we don’t know, but there have been several theories propagated to fill the considerable gap in knowledge left by Romney’s ongoing silence. Mark Maremont, a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter at the Wall Street Journal (and a former classmate of mine at journalism school), has suggested that -- perfectly legally -- Romney contributed to his IRA using the low-basis, low-value stock he received as a partner at Bain Capital in the various buyouts the firm did while Romney was there.
For instance, after Bain bought Domino’s Pizza in 1998 for $1.1 billion, Bain partners (and the limited partners who went in on the deal) were able to get a slice of the equity of the company. Given the high leverage put into the pizza maker to finance its purchase, it’s a safe bet there was very little equity value at the start, meaning that shares with little book value could be contributed to the IRA.
If Romney put $30,000 worth of Domino’s Pizza stock into his 1998 SEP-IRA, it is conceivable that it would be worth many times that amount when Domino’s went public in 2004. If Romney did the same thing over and over again during the 15 years he was at Bain doing leveraged buyouts, it is conceivable that the $450,000 would increase greatly in value.

Of course, not every deal Bain did worked out. But let’s say Romney was prescient and put into this hypothetical IRA only the stock of the buyout companies that did well, returning to investors a whopping 10 times their money. (This is very rare but conceivable.) Even so, that would turn Romney’s $450,000 into $4.5 million. If the money was also compounded and reinvested over the years and became, say, $10 million, that would still leave another $11 million to $92 million of unexplained value sitting in the presumptive Republican Party presidential nominee’s IRA.

Mighty Oak

This great mystery seems to have troubled others, as well. On July 3, Current TV host Jennifer Granholm, a former Democratic governor of Michigan, invited Edward Kleinbard, a law professor at the University of Southern California, on her show to discuss how Romney could have accomplished this remarkable feat. There were “only two possibilities,” Kleinbard told Granholm. Either “from a little acorn, a mighty oak grew very, very quickly, extraordinarily so,” Kleinbard explained, causing Granholm to interject, “What little acorn could grow to be $101 million? I want to get some of that acorn!”

The other possibility, Kleinbard suggested, was not dissimilar to what Maremont theorized: that Romney contributed limited-partnership interests in Bain’s buyouts to his IRA. What was “quite troubling” to Kleinbard is that he suspected Romney may have contributed these interests to his IRA at a fraction of their market value -- “pennies on the dollar” -- and well below what he might have charged you or me. When the buyouts became successful, Kleinbard proposed, the pennies on the dollar were suddenly worth real dollars.

“What’s very frustrating to me about all this is that we can only talk in abstractions and generalities because, again, of the lack of disclosure,” Kleinbard said.

Without mentioning the heroics Romney has accomplished in his IRA, the New York Times editorialized on July 10 that the rest of Romney’s opaque “tax avoidance” schemes -- including overseas shelters in the Cayman Islands, Switzerland and elsewhere -- amount to nothing short of a “financial black hole” that he would be well advised to explain to the public. He should put explaining his magical IRA at the top of the list.

(William D. Cohan, a former investment banker and the author of “Money and Power: How Goldman Sachs Came to Rule the World,” is a Bloomberg View columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)

Today’s highlights: the editors on good news from Guantanamo, why Jamie Dimon’s bonus should be clawed back and how to put more electric cars on the road; William D. Cohan on Romney’s magical IRA; Albert R. Hunt on the candidates’ need to spell out debt-cutting plans; Anthony Luzzatto Gardner on Bain Capital under Romney; Stephen Marche explains why Canadians are now richer than Americans.

To contact the writer of this article: William D. Cohan at wdcohan@yahoo.com

To contact the editor responsible for this article: Tobin Harshaw at tharshaw@bloomberg.net

There is nothing in the Huffington Post article to suggest he did anything illegal. Working your money in the most "tax advantageous" way possible - that is the American way. Just because he is doing it with $100 million instead of $14,000 doesn't make it more or less ethical. Plenty of people look for ways to reduce their taxes - claiming a "home office" or writing off dry cleaning bills as a professional expense...it is very common.

It certainly does "suggest" that something might very well be unkosher with Romney's finances and that his refusal to do what all other recent presidential candidates have done - his own father included - and release several years of tax returns so that he can demonstrate that there is nothing illegal or unseemly with how he accumulated $20 million to $100 million in a tax deferred account into which he can only put $30,000 per year. We're clearly not talking about a home office or dry cleaning bills here- and the people want to know just exactly what it is we are looking at. This man wants to be President of the United States for God's sake.

The article presents a number of ways that this could possibly happen. Romney is filthy rich - that fact is well established. We need to focus on issues here and not all this smoke and mirrors. Look, there are monster loopholes in the tax code. We all know that. Romney is a shrewd business man. We all know that. Why would you expect him to do anything different. If we are saying it is unethical - then we all should take a look at our own tax returns to see if we have ever deceived uncle sam in order to keep a little bit more of our money. The size of the amount is irrelevant.

"Before Romney was elected Massachusetts governor, federal law capped annual pre-tax IRA contributions at $2,000 and annual 401(k) retirement contributions at $30,000 with a company match as the Journal notes. Cohan reported that Bain used what’s known as a SEP-IRA during Romney's time as head of Bain, which has a slightly higher yearly maximum contribution of $30,000.

Given these contribution limits, experts are scratching their heads Before Romney was elected Massachusetts governor, federal law capped annual pre-tax IRA contributions at $2,000 and annual 401(k) retirement contributions at $30,000 with a company match as the Journal notes. Cohan reported that Bain used what’s known as a SEP-IRA during Romney's time as head of Bain, which has a slightly higher yearly maximum contribution of $30,000.

Given these contribution limits, experts are scratching their heads about the rapid growth of the account in the decade since Romney officially left the private equity firm Bain Capital.

“It’s extremely unusual,” said George Yin, a professor of law and taxation at the University of Virginia and former chief of staff of the U.S. Congress Joint Committee on Taxation. “The IRA, since its inception, has had very clear limits on the amount that can be contributed each year. And it's way less than $100 million.”

++++++++++++++++++++

"experts are scratching their heads" This ability to parlay an account that can only receive contributions of up to $30,000 per year into upwards of $20,000,000 to perhaps $100,000,000 is something Mitt should be so proud of - it shows such skill and intelligence in picking investments- it would so confirm his businessman chops -- he shouldn't be as shy as he is to show how it's done. He should stop hiding his light under a basket! He could show sheer genius here!

i was referring back to a comment frogman made about Mao being a great man who made some "errors", but you probably agree with that too. After all, you're dumb enough to think Obama cares about the 99%. And so passionately too. All those caps and exclamation points. You must be a really earnest human.

Mao led the Chinese Revolution which resulted in China becoming a world power, resulted in hunger being eradicated in China and a billion people lifted out of extreme poverty. In China people blog and tweet against the authorities and also have demonstrations that have resulted in the downfall of corrupt local authorities. They even sue the government and have forced the execution of corrupt businessmen. Workers go on strike and win things. It is alleged that Mao killed 50 million Chinese. Yet Mao is adored in China. Yet no one comes forward to claim compensation for these alleged crimes. Yet Chinese can leave and return to their country as they choose. Now, someone who leads such accomplishments is bound to make mistakes and do things that you or I might not approve of. Lincoln abolished habeus corpus. He allowed the rich to openly buy themselves out of having to serve their country. This resulted in the New York draft riots that forced the army to take troops out of the battle of Gettysburg and put the outcome of the entire war at risk. On top of that he had appointed inefectual commanders and at least one of questionable loyalty, Lafayette Baker. All in all though we rightly call Lincoln a hero and liberator and the savior of this nation. Ditto Mao.

You need to read slowly and for comprehension. The point is it's virtually impossible for an individual Retirement Account to have mounted up to an amount between $20 million and $100 million. People who are expert in these matters are "scratching their heads" in wonderment at this feat. Unlike those who have run for president in the past Romney is refusing to release the past few years of his tax returns and says he is doing it because the other side could pick the returns apart. Really? Even other republicans are saying he has to come across with this information. They don't want to get blindsided with exposure of some Romney criminality after the convention-- they'd like to know if they've made a big mistake now and not when it becomes too late.

Even members of his own evil empire Republican Party are calling on Mitt Romney to release his tax returns.

“Mitt Romney dismissed calls from within his own party Tuesday to release additional years of tax returns, arguing that some of his fellow Republicans don't quite get the destructive capacity of Democratic opposition researchers…”

His own party knows that he has to release those tax returns. It is not that his party is open and honest they just know the political system and how the system works. Mitt Romney will have to release his tax returns.

Many Americans decide who they are going to vote for by watching a man run for election. Can he speak? Can he debate? Can he run his organization for his election? Who does he pick to be his running mate?

How does the guy look? Is he a family man?

Tax returns are one thing they want to see.

Mitt Romney is being crazy at this point. He also appears to be stupid.

There has got to be something very bad in those tax returns. The longer he does not release them the more people are going to think that the contents are very bad.

Will the tax returns show that he made donations to the Communist Party or the KKK?

No, I do not think it is going to show something like that… But Americans are starting to think the worst because he will not just release his tax returns.

The one tax return that he release showed that he paid a 15% tax rate. That is less than you and I and most Americans pay. There was some talk about it for a week or so and then everyone moved on to some other subject. We all just said sure he is a rich Republican and he plays the system and of course he is going to pay as little tax as he can. We expected it.

What ever is in the tax returns that he does not want to release has got to be bad. It must scare him shitless. It might be that he did not pay any taxes at all. That would be bad. Running for President of the United States and you did not even pay any taxes. But even as bad as that would be it would be talked about for two or three weeks and then we would forget about it. Again we do not expect the 1% to pay taxes. We know they fuck us and we expect it.

I think the problem for Mitt Romney is that this all shows how out of touch with the real world and the American people he is … He knew he had a problem with his tax returns but he just decided well to hell with the people they just will not get to see them and so then I have no problem. What sort of President would a man like that be?

This crazy mode that he is in now is going to make him mess up even more… In order to change the subject will he pick the wrong man for VP? Or will he announce the VP pick to soon to try and change the subject?

Truth is I would not care about tax returns. But I want to see Mitt Romney’s tax returns and each day I want to see them more.

I really don't care. If you are that concerned about Romneys tax returns lets be concerned about everyones tax returns and lets see who has money in offshore accounts and scrutinize them.

As far as the 15% lets scrutinize everyone else who is making a 15% tax rate.

If there was an issue with how Romney made the money and if something was illegal about it then you can be sure the IRS would charge him or it would be in the news.

Give it up - how about we focus on jobs and who is going to do a better job of getting jobs.

Obama never in his entire life been involved with the day to day operations of a company but yet claims he generated millions of jobs - yah, right millions of jobs on taxpayer money - any dummy can do that

What is his record on creating jobs in the private sector where he owned or operated a company that was successful - there isn't any.

As far as being out of touch with America - Obama leads all presidents - when he say that businesses aren the ones who should take credit for creating jobs - Yah, he's really in touch isn't he.

He never set foot on United States soil until he was 18 and the people he hung around with were socialists.

He said when he was 11 he used to take trips on a greyhound bus and stay at Howard Johnson.

There were never any greyhound busses in Hawaii nor were there Howard Johnsons there while he was there.

"I really don't care. If you are that concerned about Romneys tax returns lets be concerned about everyones tax returns and lets see who has money in offshore accounts and scrutinize them."

I'm more concerned now about the guy who might become President and who is running on a platform of "less taxes for the rich." Actually the
Republicans have so crippled and distorted the IRS budget and spending priorities that so much is spent trying to catch people who get Earned Income Credits overstating their incomes in order to get bigger refunds than are on the job trying to scrutinize these Cayman/Swiss offshore tax dodges. They did however get cooperation from some Swiss banks and offered amnesty to tax dodgers of the one percent who were using this dodge. Could it be the Mittster availed himself of this amnesty? Inquiring minds want to know.
right millions of jobs on taxpayer money - any dummy can do that"

Right! and that's what is needed right now-- millions of government funded jobs doing things that need to be done- everything from teachers and fire fighters to making our bridges and highways safe to high speed rail. Bring on the idiocy! We need idiotic government jobs!
"

I'm no big Obama fan but the fact is when he took office the country was losing around 700,000 jobs a month, a collapse that could not be sustained much longer. Obama had to negotiate with Republicans and stealth Republicans such as Lieberman and Nelson but he did get an economic stimulus through Congress that did stop and reverse this collapse, though the recovery is anemic and not adequate. Romney lies when he says the economy is worse now than it was when Obama came in. Flat out lies.

Abe Lincoln - business exec? JFK business exec? Dwight David Eisenhower business exec? Harry Truman haberdasheries salesman, Shrub failed daddy's boy business exec. FDR not a business exec either. Romney a financial genius who was able to take an account into which he only put thirty thousand a year and turn it into nine to ten digit money, something folks want to understand better.

We are not now losing 700,000 jobs a month. In fact we are adding jobs but at far too slow a pace. We need a much bigger stimulus than Obama proposed and than he was able to get passed in Congress. Actually what we need is revolution. In my opinion Obama is part of the problem but the bigger issue right now is stopping the rabid lunatics of the Tea Party.

And where do you think this additional "stimulus" is going to come from.
You see, the government has spent 5 trillion dollars over the last 3 years.

That 5 trillion dollars was injected into the economy "somewhere". Now, that money is gone, the economy hasn't changed much and the unemployment rate is still over 8%.

Now, you want to inject trillions more into the economy thinking that "it will solve the problem" - but you are wrong.

What's going to replace that money when it's gone? What replaced the 5 trillion the governmnt spent over the past 3 years. The GDP is still around 2% and inflation is killing us.

If that 5 trillion came from private sector in the form of jobs it wouldn't be an issue because there would be a "money base" where that was generated from and that "money base" would continue to generate more money.

When it comes from the government in the form of taxes those taxes are taken out of the productive "money base" and instead of makng the economy expand, it collapses because government spending doesn't make a profit on the money it spends. .

What do you think happens when the government keeps printing money - the value of the dollar goes down just like it is doing right now.

We can afford to take money out of that productive money base in the Cayman Islands and another one in Switzerland. Also the US government can borrow money very very cheaply right now, at times Treasury notes have actually commanded a negative interest rate. So, let's not allow our productive forces to rust and rot while money is being sat upon.

MSNBC falls in the same category as CNN - they continue for hours on end trying to make Romney look like the "big evil rich guy".

Again as I have stated Obama doesn't have a "private jobs record" and that is one reason this country is so screwed up - he is clueless - moronic and thinks it's the governments job to provide jobs in this country.

Sorry fail - you can live in your own world if you want to - just don't try to sell it to others unless it is a fiction publisher. Sorry that you can not face reality even when it comes out of the Mittens own mouth as he demonstrates his lie's and his lying about his lie's.

Like Obama the "fiction publisher". Look, I could care less what Romney does with his wealth - he made it, he has it, and he can do with what he wants with it.

I do care however, what the Obimination is doing to this country with regard to turning it into a socialist country.

I would much rather have a person who knows what capitalism is all about then have another term of the Obimination who knows nothing about capitalism other then leading people puppets to believe that it is bad to be a capitalist.

Again take that story to a fiction publisher. Look at reality - yeah Obummer signed some BS things - but why? Could it have been that one of those items was attached to a military funding bill? The funding set to expire? The military left overseas with out support?

Hhmmm

OH and the tax cuts extension? The one that included the wealthy? Didn't that pass because the repubs would not remove the wealthy from the tax break and allow the needy to continue to receive the aid?

Like I said you can live in your own little bizarre world but don't try to sell fiction as reality.

Watch the whole program or are you afraid that your shell of revisionist history will crumble?

No it isn't because you like lot of other people would look for ways to use to improve the economy - I guarentee you wouldn't give it all to the banks to prop them up would you.

No, you would look for ways to give it to private businesses (with strings attached) to help the economy recover.

The Obimination didn't do that - he pissed it away on banks and big business. Why couldn't an indivdual just borrow money directly from the government instead of having to go through a bank at outrageous interest rates.

The feds only charge the banks 0.01% sometimes even 0%. Why couldn't that be the case with homeowners?